Wow Wednesday

Well, no time for Word Wednesday today, since we have open house at school tonight. But I have an hour at home, so I thought I'd give you some things that I've been 'wowed' by lately:

The domestic scenes of David Willburn which you can find here and a discussion and critique about his work by Joetta Maue found here

And a blog post by Hannah Lamb (found here) about the importance of considering and being inspired by historical textiles.

And I'll leave you with a piece by Joetta Maue (one of my favorite textile artists) who combines the two- she embroiders domestic scenes on historic/vintage textiles. Her work is awesome! You can browse her gallery here.

Merry Monday- I'm back!

So happy to be back here- I've missed this little blog! And Merry Monday is a great place to start again, as I have many things to be merry about :) Well, make that a bitter-sweet merry. I actually thought the title of this post should be "Missing My Babies", but I thought that was just a little over-the-top sappy and decided against it. (Plus, I know Eddie would have a heyday with that one and never let me live it down!) But, I really do miss my babies and that's what makes the last few weeks good and bad at the same time.  So here are my last few weeks, in a picmonkey photo collage nutshell :

This was my last summer day taking care of  Peanut. I was ready to go back to work, but I hated the thought of not having as much time with him.

But.... I still have my Saturdays with him. And this week I got a bonus, as he stayed overnight Friday night. We watched movies, played ball, painted and played trains. So much fun!

And then, I had to leave my other baby. We dropped Little Man off at his new home, Columbia College, the day before I went back to work. So I now have an empty nest for the first time in almost 29 years and 10 months. Crazy, isn't it? After a couple of meltdowns, I'm adjusting :)

I've been finding some treasures as the kids and I continue to sort through their dad's things. I found this little embroidery (or maybe it's needlepoint??) that I made when I was about 10 years old. I thought it was ironic that I found this just after I decided to focus more on my fiber work. Just the fact that I was embroidering at the age of 10 must mean something. And the message is meaningful, too. A willing heart does make it easier to get things done.

And so, I'm trying to get things done. This was a little batch of blueberry dye that I used to dye a couple of onesies. It wasn't just blueberry colored dye, it was the actual juice left over from boiling some blueberries. I've been wanting to experiment more with natural dyes and this was my first attempt at dyeing fiber. (I tried it on eggs this past Easter and it worked really well.) Anyway, I found some really good advice here. The first one shows the effect of loosely binding, then dyeing. The second one was just plopped into the dye bath with no binding. I definitely like the loose binding better. Next up- yellow and red onion skins and some different binding techniques.

And those yoga poses that I stitched about a month ago on some unbleached muslin-- they became pillows! I really like how they turned out. They are lined with an extra layer of muslin, backed with pieces of a re-claimed duvet cover and filled with a higher quality, silk-blend filling (which makes them super soft). They will be in my shop when it re-opens in the next couple of weeks.

And, last, but not least, having a "free day" to do whatever the heck I wanted to do, made me very happy yesterday. I chose to spend part of it baking some gluten free bread. I know it sounds gross, but it actually tastes like real bread! And when you follow a gluten free diet, you have no idea how much you miss bread. So this was a treat for me :)

I hope your Monday has been a merry one~ Juli

An update....

Well, the summer list is getting much shorter. (Thank goodness since my summer break is almost over. Two weeks from today and I'll be back at it, full time.) But, there are two things on my list that I didn't get to...overhauling my Etsy shop and finishing more paintings. Well, maybe that's one thing!?  Either way, they didn't happen. So, I've taken this as a sign and decided to close my Etsy shop for a short while and focus on getting some fiber pieces finished. The shop has never been very cohesive and that's always bugged me, so...I'm taking it where my heart is and that is with the fiber works. Expect a completely different look when the shop re-opens :)

As for the blog, I won't be posting much on a regular basis for the next few weeks. I have to get Little Man moved into college and I'll need to spend some time preparing for the new school year. So, needless to say, my extra time is limited right now. Blog posts take a while to complete and I have to think a lot about them beforehand. Writing is not my forte, for sure! But, I really like doing it, so I'll be back at it as soon as I'm settled into my routine again.

In the meantime, what I will be posting on, is the progress of my fiber pieces. They will be short posts, just to show you what I've been up to. But this is really supposed to be an art blog, so I'm going to try to take it back in that direction. Merry Monday and Word Wednesday will be back soon, though!

And, if any of you were wondering about my Olive and Ash... On the Go plans (that I was hoping to start this summer), it has been put on hold due to this impending move. Really, I just can't understand why the sales are called "short sales". Why??!! They are sooooo long! We're still waiting.

Well, if you've made it to the end of this rambling post... Thank you!

Until next time, I'll leave you with some images of fiber pieces that I've been admiring and that have inspired me over the years.






The art of Joetta Maue


Rebecca Atwood Designs


Alabama Chanin


And Emma Parker of Stitch Therapy